Doña Ana County audit, safety programs win state awards

LAS CRUCES - The New Mexico Association of Counties has informed Doña Ana County that it has been selected to receive the FY 2016 Audit Accountability Award for large counties.

Each year NMAC and the state auditor select counties that prove their dedication to ethical financial practices that safeguard their public assets. According to NMAC representative Aelysea Webb, the award criteria include outstanding work on audits, submitting audits in a timely manner and having sustained excellence with the highest audit opinions for the past three years.

In February of 2016, Doña Ana County’s annual independent audit came back with zero findings of deficiencies in processes and protocols. It was the sixth consecutive year of clean audits for Doña Ana County, which is believed to be a state record for counties of any size.

“It’s unusual for a governmental entity of this size to get two consecutive clean audits,” said Doña Ana County Assistant Manager for Administration Vince Pokluda. “To receive six consecutive clean audits may well be unprecedented, and it’s a sparkling tribute to the county’s Finance Department for managing the strong financial protocols that have been put in place to safeguard the integrity of taxpayer funds.”

He noted that, in 2011, the New Mexico State Auditor’s Office bestowed its very first Accountability Award for Large County Audit Achievement to Doña Ana County. The award was co-sponsored by the New Mexico Association of Counties.

“Occasionally, department heads and elected officials complain about the budgeting and procurement processes that we have in place,” Pokluda said. “The processes may be cumbersome at times, but they’re in place for good reasons, and this string of clean audits demonstrates that they’re working as they should.

In addition to the audit-accountability award, NMAC Loss Prevention Chief James Chavez has notified Doña Ana County that it has won the 2017 NMAC Workers’ Compensation Award for large counties, which also will be awarded Jan. 18 at the NMAC Legislative Conference in Santa Fe.

“This has been our fifth consecutive year in reducing the frequency and severity of workplace injuries,” Burick said. “Specifically, for this past calendar year, we experienced a 41 percent decrease in injuries and a 60 percent decrease in employees being restricted in their work activities or missing work attributed to injuries in the workplace.”